Wednesday, April 21, 2010

"I'm shocked, shocked to find that gambling is going on in here!"

Just read an interesting piece in the NYT about the Goldman Sachs debacle. In it the author says: "Many more people now know that synthetic C.D.O.’s are a simple wager." Well, duh.

I'm reminded of the famous line in the Casablanca when Claude Rains feigns shock that there is gambling going on.

Capitalism has become so enmeshed and dependent on Wall Street that it risks transformation from a model of providing quality goods and honest services to a model based on simple (or not so simple) gambling. And sometimes the dice are even loaded.

Maybe it's just me.

6 comments:

Rich said...

Free market capitalism is millions of people freely making buying, selling and investing decisions hundreds of millions times each day. The large entities that buy privilege and advantage from the government that grants same are fascistic not capitalistic. Best not to condemn the wrong system.

Harvey said...

"freely making buying, selling and investing decisions "
sounds perfect. But when these decisions are based on deceptive information, fraudulent claims, etc. is that capitalism too? Are all "capitalists" honest by definition? And if they aren't does government have a role to play in protecting citizens?

Harvey said...

PS. Hi Rich :-)

Harvey said...

PPS. I'm not condemning capitalism. I merely recognize that capitalism, like any other economic system is too often perverted.

Rich said...

Hi Harvey,
I thought you were saying the whole free market system had moved to a gambling casino model.
Rich

Harvey said...

Not at all. What we think of as investing vis a vis Wall Street has morphed. I did not make the distinction clear enough in the original post and have updated it.